UK citizen in Portugal wanting to work

[Flyingboy33]

I do apologise if I am somehow repeating this question, but trying to obtain what I thought would be a simple answer is proving difficult.

I am a British citizen, born and with a family tree going back as far as 1533. Anyhow long story short, I lost my job in London (Economic migrants undercutting my salary) so a lover of Portugal I scooped up my savings and moved (renting through Airbnb) here two months ago.

I have given myself 6 months to get a bit of a grasp on the language in the hope of finding work once I feel confident I can converse with customers in my field of expertise, hospitality management. Given their will be a hotel boom in Porto over the coming years.

Anyhow, I have googled until I am blue in the face to find out what it is I need to do or obtain, if anything to work here in Portugal.

I have so far obtained a fiscal number but this was after being passed to 3 different offices by the unhelpful people here. I was directed to a 4th office to complete a residency form to which the lady told me "I can not help you, my best advise is that you go back to the UK". Not sure how or if I'd offended her I just gave up looking and continued with my language courses.

I have started to apply for jobs, all of which state " must have legal right to work" here. So again I started to search what it is I need here, again if anything? The British embassy website and the gov.uk website have information for Portugal but it's all about living, health and benefits along with death. There is no advice on working here and what you will need in order to do so.

I stumbled upon this board through "asking Google"
Hope someone can advise or at least point me in the right direction.

Many thanks in advance

[noajthan]

Welcome.

Get up to speed on EU free movement here:
http://ec.europa.eu/justice/citizen/doc ... 013_en.pdf

It's not Portugal specific but will give you an idea of you're basic rights and what you're aiming for.

In principle your passport should be enough as you're an EEA national.
But if you can get a residence certificate (RC) that will confirm your status to potential landlords, employers & etc.

You will just have to overlay the Portugal specifics.

There may be some clues here:
http://www.euraxess.pt/incoming/visas/#ue_eea_ch

Stays of more than three months (require Certificate of Registration)

The citizens of the European Union, as well as nationals of Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein and Switzerland, whose stay in national territory lasts more than three months must formalise their right of residence through a Certificado de Registo requested during a period of 30 days after the three months of entry into Portugal in the Câmara Municipal of the residence area

Good luck.